The Fall of Fountain Heights

[Intro]
(A lone, mournful acoustic guitar, fingerpicked slowly. A haunting harmonica plays a simple, sorrowful melody.)

[Verse 1]
Just east of Columbia, that valley was our own
Yeah, Fountain Heights, Tennessee, the only home we'd known
Four generations of my blood ran deep in that red ground
The deepest roots a family had ever, ever found
My grandad built his house by hand, my father did the same
And I was proud to carry on the weight of our good name.

[Chorus]
(A slow, heavy drum beat enters, like a funeral march. A mournful cello swells.)
And the bulldozers came like thunder, to a promise they had made
Said progress was a-comin', for the price that we all paid
They took our homes and scattered us like leaves upon the wind
For a concrete dream of power where a new world would begin
And they drowned our history 'neath a sky of empty blue
But the water never came, 'cause their promises weren't true.

[Verse 2]
The letters came on Tuesday, for the two that I called mine
Said my inheritance was worthless, signed on their dotted line
We fought 'em in the courthouse, with our backs against the wall
But you can't fight a piece of paper when it's come to claim it all
They called it Eminent Domain, a fancy word for theft
Said it was the greater good, 'til there was nothin' of us left.

[Chorus]
And the bulldozers came like thunder, to a promise they had made
Said progress was a-comin', for the price that we all paid
They took our homes and scattered us like leaves upon the wind
For a concrete dream of power where a new world would begin
And they drowned our history 'neath a sky of empty blue
But the water never came, 'cause their promises weren't true.

[Bridge]
(The music gets very sparse. Just the acoustic guitar and the raw, gravelly vocal.)
I drove out there last Sunday, to that scar upon the land
Just a skeleton of concrete that the weeds have taken command
And I asked old man Derryberry why the work had all run dry
He just shook his head and laughed and said, with a fire in his eye,
"They found a three-inch fish down there, they called a 'snail darter'."
"Said savin' its own family home was suddenly much smarter."

[Outro]
(The harmonica returns, more sorrowful than before. The music slowly fades.)
Yeah, the dam is just a ruin, and the land is overgrown
And they never offered back the only home we'd ever known
We lost it all, our past, our homes, our truth, our sacred ground...
For a snail darter they had to save... in a lake they never drowned.
Yeah, for a fish... and a lie.
(A final, mournful harmonica note hangs in the air and fades.)